Jamie was quiet for what seemed a long time. Then he sighed, and turned his head so his cheek rested against my hair; I heard the faint rasp of his whiskers.

“Sassenach—I would have done the same, and counted my life well lost, if it saved ye. If he feels the same, then ye’ve done nay wrong to him, to take your life from his hand.”

“Oh, dear,” I said. “Oh, dear.” I didn’t want to think of any of it—not Tom’s clear gray look and the calling of gulls, not the lines of affliction that carved his face into pieces, not the thought of what he had suffered, in loss, in guilt, in suspicion—in fear. Nor did I want to think of Malva, going unwitting to that death among the lettuces, her son heavy and peaceful in her womb. Nor the dark rusty blood drying in gouts and splashes among the leaves of the grapevines.

Above all, I didn’t want to think that I had had any part in this tragedy—but that was inescapable.

I swallowed, hard.

“Jamie—can it ever be made right?”

He held my hand now, in his other hand, stroking his thumb gently back and forth under my fingers.

“The lass is dead, mo chridhe.”

I closed my hand on his thumb, stilling it.

“Yes, and someone killed her—and it wasn’t Tom. Oh, God, Jamie—who? Who was it?”

“I dinna ken,” he said, and his eyes grew deep with sadness. “She was a lass who craved love, I think—and took it. But she didna ken how to give it back again.”

I took a deep breath and asked the question that had lain unspoken between us since the murder.

“You don’t think it was Ian?”

He nearly smiled at that.

“If it had been, a nighean, we’d know. Ian could kill; he couldna let you or me suffer for it.”

I sighed, shifting my shoulders to ease the knot between them. He was right, and I felt comforted, on Ian’s account—and still more guilty, on Tom Christie’s.

“The man who fathered her child—if that wasn’t Ian, and I so hope it wasn’t—or someone who wanted her and killed her from jealousy when he found she was pregnant—”

“Or someone already wed. Or a woman, Sassenach.”

That stopped me cold. “A woman?”

“She took love,” he repeated, and shook his head. “What makes ye think it was only the young men she took it from?”

I closed my eyes, envisioning the possibilities. If she had had an affair with a married man—and they had looked at her, too, only more discreetly—yes, he might have killed her to keep it undiscovered. Or a scorned wife … I had a brief, shocking glimpse of Murdina Bug, face contorted with effort as she pressed the pillow over Lionel Brown’s face. Arch? God, no. Once again, with a sense of utter hopelessness, I turned away from the question, seeing in mind the myriad faces of Fraser’s Ridge—one of them hiding a murderer’s soul.

“No, I know it can’t be fixed for them—not Malva, or Tom. Or—or even Allan.” For the first time, I spared a thought for Tom’s son, so suddenly bereft of his family and in such dreadful circumstances. “But the rest …” The Ridge, I meant. Home. The life we had had. Us.

It had grown warm under the quilt, lying together—too warm, and I felt the heat of a hot flush wash over me. I sat up abruptly, throwing off the quilt, and leaned forward, lifting the hair off my neck in hopes of an instant’s coolness.

“Stand up, Sassenach.”

Jamie rolled out of bed, stood up, and took me by the hand, pulling me to my feet. Sweat had already broken out on my body like dew, and my cheeks were flushed. He bent and, taking the hem of my shift in both hands, stripped it off over my head.

He smiled faintly, looking at me, then bent and blew softly over my breasts. The coolness was a tiny but blessed relief, and my nipples rose in silent gratitude.

He opened the shutters for more air, then stepped back and pulled off his own shirt. Day had broken fully now, and the flood of pure morning light glimmered on the lines of his pale torso, on the silver web of his scars, the red-gold dusting of hair on his arms and legs, the rust and silver hairs of his sprouting beard. Likewise on the darkly suffused flesh of his genitals in their morning state, standing stiff against his belly and gone the deep, soft color one would find in the heart of a shadowed rose.

“As to putting things right,” he said, “I canna say—though I mean to try.” His eyes moved over me—stark naked, slightly salt-encrusted, and noticeably grimy about the feet and ankles. He smiled. “Shall we make a start, Sassenach?”

“You’re so tired you can barely stand up,” I protested. “Um—with certain exceptions,” I added, glancing down. It was true; there were dark hollows under his eyes, and while the lines of his body were still long and graceful, they were also eloquent of deep fatigue. I felt as though I’d been run over by a steamroller myself, and I hadn’t been up all night burning down forts.

“Well, seeing as we’ve a bed to hand, I didna plan to stand up for it,” he replied. “Mind, I may never get back on my feet again, but I think I might be able to stay awake for the next ten minutes or so, at least. Ye can pinch me if I fall asleep,” he suggested, smiling.

I rolled my eyes at him, but didn’t argue. I lay down upon the grubby but now-cool sheets, and with a small tremor in the pit of my stomach, opened my legs for him.

We made love like people underwater, heavy-limbed and slow. Mute, able to speak only through crude pantomime. We had barely touched one another in this way since Malva’s death—and the thought of her was still with us.

And not only her. For a time, I tried to focus only on Jamie, fixing my attention on the small intimacies of his body, so well known—the tiny white cicatrice of the triangular scar at his throat, the whorls of auburn hair and the sunburned skin beneath—but I was so tired that my mind refused to cooperate, and persisted in showing me instead random bits of memory or, even more disturbing, imagination.

“It’s no good,” I said. My eyes were shut tight, and I was clinging to the bedclothes with both hands, sheets knotted in my fingers. “I can’t.”

He made a small sound of surprise, but at once rolled away, leaving me damp and trembling.

“What is it, a nighean?” he said softly. He didn’t touch me, but lay close.

“I don’t know,” I said, close to panic. “I keep seeing—I’m sorry, I’m sorry, Jamie. I see other people; it’s like I’m making love to other m-men.”

“Oh, aye?” He sounded cautious, but not upset. There was a whish of fabric, and he drew the sheet up over me. That helped a little, but not much. My heart was pounding hard in my chest, I felt dizzy and couldn’t seem to take a full breath; my throat kept closing.

Bolus hystericus, I thought, quite calmly. Do stop, Beauchamp. Easier said than done, but I did stop worrying that I was having a heart attack.

“Ah …” Jamie’s voice was cautious. “Who? Hodgepile and—”

“No!” My stomach clenched in revulsion at the thought. I swallowed. “No, I—I hadn’t even thought of that.”

He lay quietly beside me, breathing. I felt as though I were literally coming apart.

“Who is it that ye see, Claire?” he whispered. “Can ye tell me?”

“Frank,” I said, fast, before I could change my mind. “And Tom. And—and Malva.” My chest heaved, and I felt that I would never have air enough to breathe again.

“I could—all of a sudden, I could feel them all,” I blurted. “Touching me. Wanting to come in.” I rolled over, burying my face in the pillow, as though I could seal out everything.

Jamie was silent for a long time. Had I hurt him? I was sorry that I’d told him—but I had no defenses anymore. I could not lie, even for the best of reasons; there was simply no place to go, nowhere to hide. I felt beset by whispering ghosts, their loss, their need, their desperate love pulling me apart. Apart from Jamie, apart from myself.

My entire body was clenched and rigid, trying to keep from dissolution, and my face was pushed so deep into the pillow, trying to escape, that I felt I might suffocate, and was obliged to turn my head, gasping for breath.